Three Days Till the Full Moon
by That Tath
Summary: When a spell backfires while on a hiking trip, Remus is not only separated from his friends, he doesn't remember he's a werewolf. Now, the Marauders have only three days to find him or he may very well transform in the middle of a Muggle town.
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer: I only own the Muggles. I do not own the Marauders or any of the places.**

**A/N: Okay, this may take place in the USA, but there are NOT going to be any self inserts. This story is going to have some OC's in it, but none of them are going to have a huge impact on the Marauders. That being said, I hope you enjoy this story! Oh, and a huge thanks for my beta Authoressintears!**

"C'mon guys, hurry up!" James yelled to his friends. They were celebrating their graduation from Hogwarts by having a week long hiking trip in the Northwest corner of Connecticut because, as Sirius put it, "What's the fun in having one last hurrah if you don't even leave the country?"

"You can always slow down you know," Remus yelled back. "Peter is already gasping for air and Sirius feels the need to stop and sniff every little thing." He gave the black dog a little kick to get him moving again. "I think we should stop here, it's the best place we've seen all day."

"It's too rocky and hilly here though!" Peter protested. "Let's see if we can find a better spot."

Sirius, who had now changed back into a human, rolled his eyes. "We're in the Northwest corner of Connecticut, Wormtail! It's going to be rocky and hilly everywhere." He began rifling through a bag, muttering to himself, "Now, where did I put those tents…?"

"Why can't we stay in one of those Muggle campsites?" Peter asked.

Without looking up from the bag, Sirius replied, "Well, for one thing, we don't have a lot of Muggle money left and whatever we do have is going to go towards buying food in the next town we come across, which should be Kent, if I remember correctly and the full moon is coming up soon, so we need to be as far away from people as possible."

"Don't remind me," Remus mumbled, enlarging another bag and looking through it for the tents as well. It seemed like all he could think about recently was the full moon. He was constantly worrying about whether his friends would be able to control the wolf or whether he would escape and attack someone. He was tired of the different scenarios running through his head and just wanted to stop thinking about it.

"And the most important reason as to why we can't stay in a Muggle campsite is the fact that we couldn't do magic and our entire evening would be ruined!" Sirius said quickly, trying to distract his friend.

"Well, maybe not Moony's." James said, picking up on what Sirius was doing. "After all, he'll probably be the good one and spend the entire night reading."

Remus smiled. He knew what his friends were trying to do and appreciated it. "Well I don't know, I think Muggles would get slightly suspicious of the moving drawing on the front of my book…"

The group chuckled and began setting up the tents that Sirius had dug out of one of the bags. This should have been a relatively simple task, except that it was the Marauders who were doing it. Eventually, three hexes, two jinxes, nine collapsed tents, and uncountable curses later they had four small one-man tents set up. Yet even after all of that was set up and they had to set a large number of wards and protective spells to stop Muggles from discovering them. This took awhile since one of them, usually James or Sirius, would distract someone else, once again, usually James or Sirius, when they were trying to work. Finally they did manage to get everything set up and could settle down to just relax for the rest of the evening.

Well, perhaps relax isn't the right word. There were quite a few jinxes being cast and many more spells were used on each other, with the main perpetrators being Sirius and James. Remus chose to stay off to the side, quietly reading his book, though he did watch his friends 'attack' each other with a small grin on his face. Even when the other three moved on to safer pastimes, like Exploding Snap, he didn't join in the fun.

Truth be told, the only reason he wasn't joining them was because he was still too preoccupied with thoughts of the approaching full moon. It was only a few days away and he was constantly worrying about one thing or another. It seemed like every little thing made him think of him. A glance at his friends would remind him that they may not be able to control him. The moonlight reminded him of the moon getting closer and closer to full. He just needed to get away from it all, he just needed to forget it all…

He put his book in his bag and stood up, slinging his bag over his shoulder. "I'm going for a walk," he told his friends, who were busy throwing Exploding Snap cards at each other. "I'll be back in a couple of hours."

Sirius looked up with a frown on his face, which quickly turned into a grin as he saw the bag of books his friend had. "Well, with all of those books you may not even return tonight," he joked. "You'll be out there reading them for the rest of the week!"

Remus scowled at his friend. "You know I'm only bringing these because I don't trust you around them."

James laughed. "Oh c'mon, you aren't still angry at us for that trick we played back in second year, are you?" he asked. "How were we supposed to know the words would get rearranged?"

Remus just shook his head and walked away, leaving his friends to their crazy games. He was just about to leave their soundproof barrier when he heard a series of loud explosions behind them, followed by lots of screaming and the sound of water being poured on something. Remus laughed and crossed out into a world of near silence.

James, Sirius, and Peter didn't even hear him laughing at them, since they were too busy dealing with a mild fire. One of Sirius' cards had hit a pile of about fifteen or so cards that exploded at once, causing a pile of dried brush to catch on fire. This caused a small amount of screaming, mostly from a startled Peter, and them trying to put out the fire. By the time they had everything under control and had calmed down they had nearly completely forgotten about Remus.

They spent the rest of the night playing slightly calmer games, like wizard chess. After a rather vicious match between James and Sirius, which resulted in a minor scuffle and several jinxes being fired, the three decided to call it quits for the night. They had nearly fallen asleep when Sirius's voice drifted through the camp. "You know, I was only joking when I said that Remus wouldn't return tonight," he said. "When do you think he'll come back?"

"Dunno," James said. "He'll return soon though. Just go to sleep Padfoot."

Once Remus had left the camp he hadn't known exactly where he wanted to go. He didn't want to head left, down to the river, so he figured he would go right and hopefully find an area where he could just settle down and try to forget about the full moon. Eventually, after walking for about fifteen or so minutes, he saw a small cluster of rocks ahead of him. They stood about ten or so feet high, but there were 'steps' leading up to the top. Remus carefully made his way up and sat down in the center of the top rock, on an area that was mostly flat.

He set his bag down on one side of him and placed a small handful of flames on the other side of him, in a small scooped-out area of the rock, so they wouldn't roll away. He randomly grabbed a bag from his bag and was surprised to see his choice. It was a book full of various spells. The page it fell open to was well worn, since Remus had been looking at that page for the past few days. The page had the directions for a spell that would, if done correctly, erase a certain topic from a person's mind. However, the spell had a time limit, so it would run out after a specific amount of time.

Remus twirled his wand between his fingers and continued to weigh his options, as he had been for the past few days. He wanted to perform the spell, but on the other hand, there was a good chance it would go wrong. Yet the thought of not having to worry about the full moon for the next couple of days overrode his common sense. Without thinking the matter through anymore, Remus placed the tip of his wand against his head and quickly said the spell.

He knew instantly that something had gone wrong. The book had described a feeling of peace and contentment, but all Remus could feel was pain. Wave after wave of pain pounded in his head. It felt like it was literally ripping his mind apart. He screamed until finally, blissfully, he blacked out.


	2. Day One

**Disclaimer: I don't own any characters or places. **

**A/N: Wow, I can't believe the reviews I'm getting for this story, even though it's only been up for a little while! So here's the next chapter for all of you, like I promised. You guys rock!**

When James, Peter, and Sirius finally stumbled out of bed the next morning they were only slightly surprised to not see Remus up and about. He usually woke up before them, but since he hadn't even returned when they went to bed it wasn't surprising that he wasn't awake yet. The three of them tried to stay quiet as they ate breakfast and began taking down their camp. Finally, the only thing left to do was wake Remus up and have him pack up his stuff.

There was just one small problem with that…

"Hey, Moony isn't here!" Sirius said as he crawled out of Remus's tent.

Peter frowned. "What do you mean he isn't here?" He asked. "He has to be here!"

"Well he's not," Sirius said. "His bag isn't in there either. Did either of you hear him return last night?"

James shook his head. "No, but I think we all fell asleep pretty quickly last night. Look, don't worry about it; I'm sure he just wandered off earlier this morning to read, like he did last night. If he doesn't return in a little while, we'll go looking for him, alright?"

Sirius nodded. As much as he didn't like the idea of just waiting, he knew he was probably overreacting. Still, time seemed to pass incredibly slowly in the camp, even though they were trying to amuse themselves. When about an hour had passed, they finally agreed that they couldn't wait anymore.

"Wormtail, carry Remus' stuff," Sirius said as he packed it up, shrunk it, and made it lighter. He tossed it over to Peter, who somehow managed to catch it.

"Okay, so I reckon we should split up," James said. He had a map open in front of him and was tracing different paths on it while he talked. "I doubt he would have gone down to the river last night, so I'll head away from it, while you two follow it both ways. We can meet up here-" he jabbed at a spot on the map. "-around sunset. If Remus had gotten lost he probably would have headed towards Kent, so we'll slowly work our way in that direction."

Sirius nodded; he had to admit that it was a good plan. "I'll head back the way we came yesterday," he volunteered. Although he didn't say it, they all knew that he was only volunteering for that route because Peter wouldn't be able to handle the longer trek.

The group nodded their approval and, without another word, shouldered their packs and set out to look for their missing friend.

XXXXX

When Remus woke up the first thing he was aware of was his pounding headache. He groaned softly and sat up slowly, his headache already starting to fade away. He frowned as he tried to think about why he would be asleep in the middle of the woods on top of a huge pile of rocks. His eyes fell on the still open book that was lying next to him. He quickly scanned over the page, a look of understanding coming over his face.

"Remus, you git!" He whispered furiously. It was obvious that something had gone wrong. He couldn't remember why he was out here, though he did remember something about going camping and someone mentioning the town of Kent. He couldn't remember why he had cast that spell in the first place. However, even scarier than the thought of his memory being messed up was the fact that Remus didn't know how to fix it.

He took a deep breath and tried to calm down. The first thing he had to do was to try to figure out what he did and did not remember. He couldn't remember anything since leaving Hogwarts, except for a brief memory of being at his parent's house. Even thinking back on his years at Hogwarts he couldn't remember certain things. There were huge chunks of his school years just missing. He couldn't even remember who his friends were.

The first thing he had to do was find a town. He thought someone had mentioned a town called Kent, though he couldn't think of who would've said it. Remus gathered up his books and shoved everything in his bag, though he did leave his wand out. Before he left, his eyes landed on a small flame, barely visible in the sunlight. Remus picked it up and frowned. It was obvious that it was his flame; after all, he knew how to create them. Yet he couldn't remember anything about them, except for vague memories of researching flame freezing spells and altering them so they would still give off warmth and could be cast wandlessly.

_He was sitting on his bed at Hogwarts, flicking his fingers out and causing flames to appear at the ends, almost like something out of a Muggle movie. Across the room he heard a shout. He looked up just in time to see a window curtain catch on fire, courtesy of a stray fire ball. _

_He pulled out his wand and put out the fire. He tried to suppress his smile as he turned to face the others, though he could feel it threatening to break out again. "You really should try to work on the flame freezing part more, Si-"_

Remus cried out as a wave of pain washed through his mind and the memory, at least, he was assuming it was a memory, faded away. He didn't know what to think about it. All that he learned from it was the fact that he had had friends at Hogwarts. "Well, either that or I know how to speak Spanish and forgot that too," he muttered as he quenched the small fire and began to descend from the rocks.

XXXXX

Sirius was running back upriver, stopping every once in awhile to sniff at a certain spot, before shaking his head and moving on. So far he hadn't had any luck finding Remus. Well, that wasn't entirely true. It seemed like every place held a faint scent of Remus, though it was old, from when they had originally passed through. Yet the newer scent, the scent that would tell him that Remus had passed this way, wasn't there.

He growled and quickly transformed back into a human. "Damn it," he muttered. He dug his two-way mirror out of his bag, which he had been carrying on his back. "Hey James, you there?" There wasn't a response. "Damn it!" He muttered again, running his hand through his hair in frustration, a trait he had slightly picked up from James.

He sighed and kicked at a rock at his feet. It was obvious that Remus never came back this way. Sirius glanced at his watch and grimaced. He was going to have a hard time making it to their meeting place, even if he left now. It had taken him longer than he thought to come this far. He shoved everything, minus his wand, back into his bag and changed into Padfoot. Through a combination of wriggling, practice, and sheer luck he somehow managed to get it onto his back. Then, after gently picking his wand up in his mouth, he started running back towards their meeting place.

XXXXX

At first, Peter didn't see any signs of his friend, though he had to admit that he wasn't the best tracker there was. However, there weren't any footprints that he could see at least, and there weren't any scraps of fabric that could be linked back to Remus.

To put it simply, there was nothing to go on.

Yet that all changed when he managed to glimpse a small spark in a patch of mud- a small spark which, as Peter coaxed it, turned into one of their special flames. "Yes!" Peter yelled as he quickly continued to follow the trail down towards their meeting place.

XXXXX

James would have had more luck if he had veered slightly to the left not long after leaving their camp. As it was, he spent most of his day without any sign of Remus, much like his friends. It was extremely frustrating for him, since he was nearly positive that Remus would have gone this way if he had wandered off to find a place to read. It wasn't until the second half of the day when he had turned around to head out to their meeting place that he saw a sign of Remus.

A small piece of parchment with doodles over it, courtesy of Sirius, which Remus had been using as a bookmark.

If James hadn't been in his stag for he would've been punching the air with a wild grin on his face. As it was he could only manage a small, strange, deer-like grin before he began to carefully follow the small path made by Remus as he shuffled down towards the river.

XXXXX

Remus had gone slowly all day, not wanting to accidentally trip and injure himself, though even if he did hurt himself, he knew quite a few healing spells, though Remus couldn't figure out why. It was another mystery he had discovered in his life, along with the numerous scars all over his body. For some reason he felt that they were connected, which would make sense, but some of the scars were huge, almost like he had been clawed by a large animal, and Remus had no idea what could have caused them.

He finally stopped for the night just before sunset. He managed to find a spot that, while still too rocky for his liking, wasn't too bad. He lit a small fire and set up a number of spells to keep him hidden. After that was taken care of he started to transfigure various things into a tent, sleeping bag, and pillow, since, for some reason, he didn't have his.

Remus didn't stay awake for long that night, though he did spend a little bit of time looking over the books in his bag, hoping that there may be a note or letter from a friend that could provide him with some of the answers he was looking for. After checking his bag about three times he finally had to admit that the only thing in there were books and his wand and, with the search finished, he fell asleep.

_His head was pounding, pounding, pounding. He clenched his teeth together, trying not to scream, but a wave of pain washed through his body and he was screaming, screaming at the top of his lunge, but he couldn't hear himself over the pounding in his head. _

_He hunched over, trying to curl in on himself as he felt his bones breaking and rearranging, his skin burning, new bones quickly growing and shaping. His screams turned into a feral howl and the pain started to fade away, only to be replaced by blood._

Remus woke up with a start, his mouth open in a silent scream. He tried to take deep breaths to calm down but he couldn't. He was on the verge of hyperventilating and he didn't know why. He closed his eyes and just tried to calm down. Slowly, very slowly, his heart rate went down and his breathing returned to normal. Then, only then, he thought about the dream.

It had felt so _real_. He could almost feel like body changing as he thought about it. But what did it mean? That hadn't happened to him- had it? A shiver ran down his spine at the thought of ever having to go through that. Yet he couldn't get rid of the nagging voice in the back of his head that was whispering, _Maybe it's not just a dream…_

XXXXX

"I didn't see him anywhere," Sirius managed to gasp out as he arrived at their meeting place. He was thoroughly exhausted, having run the majority of the way there. "I didn't smell him anywhere either, unless you count the old scents from when we first passed through." He collapsed on the ground, only shifting slightly so his bag wasn't poking into his back.

"I didn't see anything for awhile either," Peter said. "Then I noticed little sparks, like the ones from the fire you guys can up with back in first or second year. So he's definitely heading this way."

"Good job Peter!" James said, grinning at his friend. "I didn't see anything until I started to head back. Then I found his bookmark and followed his trail down towards the river. I lost it after awhile though."

"We have a trail then?" Sirius asked as he sat up, a hopeful and excited look on his face.

Peter and James grinned at him. "We have a trail," James confirmed. "We can start following the trail in the morning and, hopefully, we'll find him in a couple of days. We still don't know why he didn't return to the camp though, so I just hope he'll be alright until then."

"I don't know about that, James," Peter said softly. He was looking up at the sky, watching the moon rise slowly into the sky. "We have less than three days until the full moon."

James's face paled. "Remus will be alright though, right?" He said. "I mean, he'll know enough to keep away from people…"

"Damn it," Sirius said suddenly. "Why didn't I think of this before? Damn it!"

"What?" James and Peter asked at the same time.

Sirius's face had paled more than James's did. "I didn't think anything of it at the time. You know how Remus is, with all his spell theory and whatnot. But the other night I saw him looking over a page in a book that talked about a spell that would cause a person to temporarily forget something, and you know how worried he was about this full moon."

"You don't think-"

Sirius nodded grimly. "That would explain why he didn't return to us, wouldn't it?" He said. "Remus is heading towards Kent and there's a good chance something's wrong with his memory. If he transforms in Kent-"

"He'll kill a human and be executed for it," James said quietly. "That is, if the wizards in Kent don't kill him first."

**A/N: I was going to go into detail about what Remus does and does not remember in and distances and whatnot, just to clear some things up, but it was too long for A/N. So check out my profile if you're confused about that.**


	3. Day Two

**Disclaimer: I don't own any recognizable characters and I own none of the places**

**A/N: So, my little story is nearly drawing to a close. Okay, not quite. I'm figuring, roughly, 3 more chapters after this. Just a little heads up for all of you. Anywho, here's the next chapter. I know it's shorter than the last one, but the next one is going to be nice and long.**

Remus didn't get much sleep that night. The strange dream he had was always on his mind and whenever he closed his eyes he could only see blood. He managed to doze off for a little bit, but when the sun woke him up he was only more tired. His headache returned as he started taking down the wards surrounding his camp, though he told himself it was just a lack of sleep and the strain of taking down the wards that brought it back.

Yet if that were the case, why didn't it go away during the day? Remus had to admit that there was something wrong with him, though that only annoyed him. He was out in the middle of the forest, hoping that he would make it to a town sometime soon and, on top of that all, he was sick and plagued by nightmares.

Remus's pace was a lot slower that day, though he didn't have to stop too often to rest. While he made his way over the tangle of roots and rocks, always trying to keep the river on his left, his mind was busy trying to remember what the spell had erased. The dream was his one major clue, but even that wasn't a lot to go on. As far as he could tell, he had been transforming into something, something that could howl and had a thirst for blood. He felt like he should know what had been going on, but the botched spell had been very thorough; it had erased any knowledge he may have had of what had happened to him in his dream.

Then there was the matter of that memory of his, the one where he had been in his dormitory at Hogwarts. Why had it cut off right before he had said that person's name? After all, what were the chances that remembering that one person would trigger his memory and he would remember everything? It didn't make any sense to him but, then again, few things about his situation made sense to Remus. Ever since he had woken up the day before his life had just seemed like one, huge puzzle to him. He was hopeful that someone in Kent would be able to help him though, and at times it seemed like that was the only thing keeping him going.

"_You don't understand!" Remus said quietly, his eyes glued to the floor. "I don't know what I would do without you. You guys are the first real friends I've had, the only reason why I'm still here!"_

"_Then tell us what's going on!" Someone said. Remus winced; he sounded angry and he couldn't blame him. _

"_I can't tell you," Remus whispered. "If you found out, you'd leave me, just like everyone else did. You wouldn't want to stay friends with me if you knew the truth."_

"_The truth?" This time the speaker was a different person, a different voice. "We know the truth Remus." Remus slowly looked up, suddenly scared and frightened, but he needed to know if they were bluffing._

Remus hissed as the pounding in his head got worse and the memory cut off. "What was that about?" He muttered to himself. Though he now had several more questions that he needed answers to, he had figured several things out about his friends. He now knew that they were somehow intertwined with whatever the spell was blocking from his mind. More importantly than that he now had a vague idea of what his friends looked like.

Although he couldn't get a clear glimpse of them, since the spell cut the memory short, he did manage to see three people. One had messy, dark hair and glasses. A second person also had dark hair, though theirs wasn't messy and they didn't have glasses. The third person had blond hair and was a bit pudgy. He was shorter than the other two, who were both about the same height. However, Remus didn't see any distinguishing facial features. There were probably a thousand people in the nearby area that fit one of those descriptions. However, to Remus that was just a small detail, barely significant. He could describe his friends, albeit not very well, and that was enough to raise his spirits.

XXXXX

_We have got to get some sort of alarm clock,_ James thought miserably. They were in the process of taking down the camp in record time because they had all slept later than they had wanted too. True, they were incredibly tired from yesterday's hunt for Remus, but they still hadn't wanted to sleep in so late. They all knew that they had to wake up early if they had any hope of catching up to Remus that day, yet somehow they all managed to oversleep.

"We never did this after the full moons," Sirius growled. It was true; during Hogwarts they had never overslept the day after a full moon. But they were always able to rest the day before, since they knew that they would be exhausted after the full moon, and they were usually woken up by the sheer amount of noise that the other students were making.

The worst part was that they couldn't even make up for their lost time. If they tried to go faster they may miss some sign of their friend and then they would lose even more time trying to find the trail again. So they crawled along, going much too slow for their liking, but knowing that they didn't have any other choice. For awhile they were content in the knowledge that they were going in the right direction. Padfoot, who was trying to sniff out Remus's trail, had led them the right way for most of the day. However, their luck couldn't hold out forever.

Around one o'clock they began to have the first hints that Remus's trail might be vanishing. They had just turned a sharp corner when Padfoot froze. He sniffed around the area, going in circles for a few minutes before starting off on a path that wound a little ways away from the river. They went along this path for a little while before Padfoot stopped again, though this time he just looked puzzle. He returned to the place where Padfoot had first had to stop and followed a different trail.

When they had to return to that one spot yet again, James scowled at his friend. "Are you sure about this path?" He asked.

Padfoot glared at him and changed back into Sirius. "You know, sniffing out one path isn't that easy," he snapped. "Especially when it's covered in rabbit and deer trails. So unless you want to try doing my job, just shut up. And yes, I'm sure about the trail this time."

He did find the right trail that time; he managed to pick up Remus's scent a little ways down the trial. However, the damage had already been done. They had wasted too much time trying to find the right trail; they wouldn't catch up to Remus that day. They gave it their best though and traveled until the last minute. They set up camp quicker than they had the night before and, after casting a small spell that would wake them up early, they fell asleep.

XXXXX

For Remus, the day got worse as it went on. The excited and happy feeling he had after "seeing" a glimpse of his friends slowly vanished and was replaced by the tiredness and soreness he had felt before. However, on top of everything else were two conflicting feelings. One was angry and savage; the other was frantic and seemed to be on the verge of panic. These two emotions were almost at war with each other, with one always trying to beat the other into submission. Remus thought that this might be why he felt so horrible, though that didn't explain why those two sides even existed in the first place.

Remus didn't want to spend a second night in the woods so he pushed himself as far as he could. Yet eventually he had to admit that he was too exhausted and sore to continue. He practically collapsed where he was and it was all he could do to cast the wards around his temporary camp. He slowly set up his tent and crawled in after making sure that no moonlight could get inside, though he didn't know why he did that. It was yet another mystery in his life, a mystery that he didn't have the solution for right now. He fell asleep almost instantly, his thoughts focused on the hope of finding help in Kent.

_Blood. _

_Blood stained the walls and the floors of the ramshackle house. Yet the house wasn't as weak as it looked; he had learned that lesson the hard way. He hated coming here, hated waiting for the moon to rise and for him to slowly feel himself being smothered. _

_A small sliver of moonlight crept in through a crack in the wall, causing Remus to shake. It wasn't time yet, but it would be soon, very soon. As if it could hear his thoughts and were mocking him, the moon finished rising into the sky. _

_Soon, house was echoing with his screams of pain. _

Remus sat up, panting, trying to push the last shreds of the nightmare out of his mind. It was just a dream, it had to be just a dream. Still, as much as he tried to calm down and fall back asleep, his mind was focused on the blood and kept him awake for the rest of the night.


	4. Day Three

**Disclaimer: The only things I own are the Muggles. **

**A/N: Sorry for the delay with this chapter! I've just been so busy recently, what with midterms coming up, all of my projects, joining Envirothon… I'll try to get the next chapter up soon though!**

When Remus woke up the next day he honestly didn't expect to make it to Kent.

He felt tired and achy, like he had stayed up half the night fighting with someone. He honestly thought that he was sick, which only made him want to get to Kent faster, though he didn't know if he would have enough energy to even do that much. He was slow and sluggish as he took down his camp. When he started out for the day, his pace was more of a shuffle than an actual walk.

The fairly short walk to Kent, a walk that should have taken him no more than an hour or so, ended up taking him nearly double that; he was more tired than he had thought, and that was saying something. It didn't really surprise him though, considering he hadn't slept for the past two nights. Every time he had drifted off he would just have another nightmare that would cause him to wake up again after only getting a few minutes of sleep.

When he saw the road off in the distance, he just wanted to run there and into Kent. However, his body didn't seem to like that idea and he just continued his shuffle up to the road. He followed it over the river and into the town that he could already see not far down the road. His shuffle-walk sped up a bit as he entered the actual town. Now that he was here he just needed to find a wizard or witch that could help him.

But first…

His eyes wandered across the street to the bakery and restaurant, his stomach growling slightly. He had had a little bit of food in his bag, but not a lot, and he was definitely very hungry. He dug around in his bag for a moment before he found the small amount of Muggle money that he had in there. He only had about thirty dollars, but it should be enough for him to get a meal.

He quickly crossed the street and entered the restaurant, thankful that he had cleaned himself up with spells before leaving the woods. The person at the register looked up as he entered and flashed a quick grin at him. "You look like you could use some food," she commented. "Just sit yourself wherever and someone will be with you shortly."

Remus chose a small table off to the side. It wasn't too busy, but that wasn't really surprisingly, since it was a weekday in the middle of the summer. Not long after he had sat down at the table a waitress came over and set a menu down in front of him. "Hi, my name's Shelly. Can I get you something to drink?" She asked.

"Ju-" he cleared his throat; his voice was hoarse, probably from whatever sickness he had. "Just water, thank you," he said softly.

The waitress frowned. He looked like he should still be in high school, or had just graduated, and it was obvious that he wasn't feeling all that good. "You alright, hun?" She asked.

Remus smiled at her. "Just feeling a bit under the weather," he said.

Shelly nodded, though it didn't look like she entirely believed him. "I'll go get your water then and let you look over the menu," she said.

The lunch menu was small, but that wasn't anything surprising, considering the size of the town and the restaurant. That didn't really matter to Remus though. Now that he was actually sitting in the restaurant he found that, although he was extremely hungry, he didn't really like the idea of eating any food. Still, when Shelly returned he ordered a meat sandwich, which, although it was good, he had to almost force himself to eat.

"Anything else I can get you?" Shelly asked as Remus finished up his sandwich.

"No, thank you," Remus said. "Unless you want to give me directions to the closest library?"

Shelly grinned. "Not even a hundred yards in that direction." She pointed to her left. "And when you're done with your lunch, you can just go up to the front counter to pay."

Remus quickly swallowed the last of his sandwiched and paid for his meal. The library in the small town near his house had a room that was run by a very friendly old witch. He was hoping that this library would be the same, so he could ask the person there for help, or at least try to find out how to fix his backfired spell.

Shelly hadn't been lying; the library was only one building down from the restaurant. From the front it just looked like a small, ordinary building and compared to some libraries it was. However, there were a fairly large selection of books inside and Remus couldn't help but grin as he saw them; he had always had a soft spot for Muggle literature.

The woman at the front desk looked up as he walked in. "Hello," she said. "Are you new here? I'm afraid I haven't seen you before."

Remus smiled at her. "No, I'm just passing through," he said. "I just hoping that you would have some of my favorite books that I could read while my friends are off doing their own thing." He figured that it wouldn't hurt to lie just a little; after all, how was he supposed to explain the fact that he doesn't remember huge chunks of his life?

The librarian smiled at him. "Well, if you go through that door there you'll get to the fiction books," she said.

Remus thanked her and walked through the doorway that she had pointed to. The room was filled with various fiction books, from newer releases to classics like Dracula. He wanted to just curl up with a book and read for the entire afternoon, but he knew he couldn't waste time, not when he needed to get research done.

He spent the next few minutes carefully combing through the various rooms, trying to see if there was a wizard section in this library. He finally spotted a small, shabby sign tucked into a dark little nook off on the side. He read it through quickly, frowned, and then read it through again. _793.73 STU_ the sign read. He knew what it was; it was the organization number for a book, but why would the number for a non-fiction book be stuck on a sign in the fiction section?

Remus walked over to the non-fiction section anyways, just to see what was so special about that book. It took him a moment to find it; the shelf that held those books was tucked away and hidden in the corner. The particular book in question happened to be about tricks to finding hidden areas in houses. Remus grinned slightly when he saw it and when he looked to his left his grin widened even more, for there was a small door on the wall. On the front was a sign, like the one in the fiction section, that read _Wizarding Section_. He pushed open the door and walked into the hidden section of the library.

XXXXX

James, Sirius, and Peter didn't waste any time the next day. They knew they were very close to Kent; they were counting on Remus to stay in Kent for that day to try to rest and figure out what was happening to him. So they had woken up early, quickly packed up their camp, and set out for Kent. It didn't take them long to find where Remus had set up his camp the night before; it was taken down very messily, though considering how horrible he was probably felt, it wasn't surprising.

They carefully followed his trail up to the main road, making sure that he hadn't veered off to the side. Only the faint, muddy footprints leading towards Kent that they saw when they first reached the pavement proved that Remus had actually gone that way. Before they got out of the trees, Sirius and Peter changed into their Animagi forms. Although they didn't like the idea of spending the rest of the days as animals, especially since Sirius would have to be on a leash, they both agreed that it would be easier to find Remus if they were animals.

Most of the people they passed avoided Sirius because of his size, but a few stopped to pet him. None of them noticed the rat that was scurrying along side them, occasionally darting off to check for signs of Remus. Sirius was sniffing along the ground occasionally, also trying to find signs of Remus. However, their plan was far from foolproof. While Sirius could sniff out Remus' trail, his scent was covered by those of all of the other people who had walked there. Sirius also couldn't be taken into any of the buildings, which meant that any buildings they thought he might be in couldn't be checked until he had a chance to change back. Finally, they managed to dart into a small cluster of trees, where Sirius and Peter changed back. The three boys then set out again into the town.

"So, which building did you want to check in, Padfoot?" James asked as they walked back along the main street of Kent.

Sirius paused for a moment to scan the buildings; it was harder for him to remember them when he couldn't rely so much on scent. Finally, he pointed to one. "That one," he said. "Caralee's, or whatever the name is. The restaurant."

The three of them quickly shrank their bags and stuffed them in their pockets before walking into the restaurant. The woman at the front counter looked at them as they walked in. Before she could say anything, Padfoot cut in. "Have you seen our friend?" He asked. "He's about our height, light brownish hair, amber eyes. He wasn't feeling too well, so he was probably a bit pale and sick looking."

The woman nodded slowly as he was speaking. "Yeah, I saw him," she said. "He left about an hour or so ago. He was early for the lunch crowd and like you said he was pale looking. I'd point you to the waitress who was working then, but she left for the day. I'm sorry."

"That's alright, you've already been a lot of help," James said. "Thanks."

The three of them left the restaurant and tried to figure out what to do next. "I don't think he would have left town," Sirius said. "It just wouldn't be like him. He's basically sick, we're pretty sure he's lost part of his memory, and now that he's found a town he would stay here until he got help."

"Well, we haven't searched this end of town yet," Peter said. "Maybe there's a wizard building down here that he found."

"You're right, Wormtail," James said. "Let's start looking around here, then we'll work our way back. After that we can double back to check some more of the buildings down closer to where Remus would have entered the town."

Although this area of the town had fewer buildings, there were also a lot of hidden back lots that needed to be checked, just in case Remus had hidden back there, though none of them really thought he did. Once they were done checking that end of town they doubled back to check some of the buildings back near where Remus would have entered the town. They looked for their friend until the middle of the afternoon, but they didn't find him anywhere.

The three of them were just slowly circling around the town, hoping to find something, anything, that could help them find Remus. With every second that passed they knew it was getting closer to the full moon. If they didn't find their friend before then, things would be very, very bad.

They were walking past the restaurant where they had first asked about their friend when Sirius let out a short bark of laughter. "I think I know where Remus is!" He said.

"Where?" James asked. "And how?"

Sirius pointed ahead of him to a small building. They had overlooked that building when they first passed through, since it was so small and they weren't sure what it was. Now, however, there were tables full of books set up outside with a sign that read _Kent Memorial Library Book Sale_. "I'll bet you anything that the first place Remus went when he got here was the library, so he could try to figure out what was wrong with him," Sirius explained. "That's why we couldn't find him earlier; he was probably tucked away in the wizarding section, completely oblivious to the world!"

Remus was really the only Marauder who ever ventured into the library. While the others had frequented the library while they were becoming Animagi and making the Map, Remus was the only one who went there a lot. So when the three of them walked into the small Kent library they were at a loss as to where they should start looking.

"Excuse me, have you seen our friend?" Sirius asked the lady at the front desk after a moment of standing there looking incredibly out of place. "He's probably been here awhile. He's our age, about our height, and has light golden-brown hair."

The woman has to think for a moment, but she finally nodded. "Yeah, he came in around noon," she said. "He said he wanted to read some of his favorite books while his friends- I'm assuming he meant you- were off doing your own thing." She pointed through a doorway. "He vanished back there and I haven't seen him since, though I was away for a bit so I might have missed him."

"Thanks," Sirius said, flashing her a quick grin.

The three of them walked through the doorway and split up. Sirius went to the left and James went to the right. Peter changed into a rat and scurried throughout the whole library, hoping to pick up some small sign that their friend had passed that way. Although the three friends were hoping to quickly search the library and find their friend, they went awhile without any sign of Remus. Finally, they met back up in a corner of the library.

"No sign of him at all," Peter said. "But if he found a wizarding section then we wouldn't find him."

"No, we would have to be looking for that section instead," James mused. "But I have no idea how we would find it. I mean, spells might work but then we'll risk the Muggles seeing us. I don't even know where in the library it would be."

"Where's Remus when you need him?" Sirius muttered. "Oh yes, that's right; he's hidden away in the room we're trying to find." He sighed. "The full moon will rise in a few hours and we still need to find him and get him a safe distance away from everyone else."

"Sirius, do shut up," James said. "You aren't helping the situation." He ran his hand through his hair. "What we need is some sort of a plan."

"I could find him," Peter offered. "There's bound to be a way to get into the walls of the library as a rat and then it's just a matter of finding the wizarding section. I can exit through the door, find you, and we can all go through that way."

However, the one problem with this plan was the sheer size of the wizarding section of the library, something that they didn't take into account. So while Peter had quickly made it into the walls and out in the wizarding section, he couldn't find the exit out and he couldn't find anyone in the library to help him. He rounded what seemed like the hundredth corner, only to see his first human.

Remus.

Peter hesitated for a moment when he saw his friend. He knew that he couldn't show any sign that he knew his friend, in fact, he probably shouldn't even talk to Remus right now, but he really did need directions. He darted behind a book shelf, changed back into a human, and stepped out again.

"Excuse me, but do you know where the exit is?" Peter asked as he walked over to his friend. "I seem to have gotten lost in here."

Remus looked up from his book and it was all Peter could do to not stare at him in shock. His friend, although clean and tidy like usual, looked more tired and ill than he had ever seen him before a full moon. There was also a hint of panic and worry on his face that Peter had rarely seen before; his friend usually tried to stay calm and composed before the full moon. "Just take the next left and then go straight," he said hoarsely. "The exit is right there."

"Thank you," Peter said. He hesitated and then, against his better judgment, blurted out, "Have we met? You seem strangely familiar…"

"No, I don't think we have," Remus said.

"Oh well, I must have been thinking about someone else then. Thanks again for the help."

As Peter was walking away, he could've sworn he heard Remus whisper, "But with my memory as bad as it is, you could be my brother for all I know."

XXXXX

"Now where was he?" James asked as they entered the wizarding section. "We only have an hour until the moon rises!"

"Just go down there and turn into that other corridor," Peter said. "I'll lead the way as a rat, since he'll probably recognize me from earlier." Peter quickly changed into Wormtail and led the way down to where Remus was before.

"Hey there Moony," Sirius said as he flopped down into a chair at the table where Remus was sitting. "How're things going?"

Remus looked up at the two boys and the rat and frowned. "Who are you?" He asked. "And what did you call me?"

"I'm James," James said as he pointed to himself. "And this git is Sirius." He gave Sirius's chair a fairly hard kick. "And he called you Moony. You know our nickname for you. Now we'd love to explain things a little bit more, but in slightly less than an hour you could very easily kill half of the people in this library, so if you'll just follow us…"

"Wait, what?" Remus stared at the people in front of him. "What the hell are you rambling about? And how do you know me?"

"Look Remus, we don't really have a lot of time for this," Sirius said quickly. "We know you from Hogwarts, you were in our dorm for seven years! And what James was babbling about was the unfortunate fact that you are a werewolf." He said the last word in a whisper. "And in less than an hour the moon is going to rise and you are going to transform. If you aren't a safe distance away from town by then you'll attack any human you meet, so we really need to leave now."

Remus hesitated. It was possible that they were telling the truth. After all, he didn't remember anything about himself, for all he knew they really were his friends. They did mention Hogwarts, and he knew that that was where he had gone to school. One of them was even called Sirius, which would explain the mysterious person in his dream who was called "Si". He didn't know what a werewolf was, but it didn't sound like anything good. That could even explain why he had cast the spell in the first place.

Finally, he looked up at the two boys in front of him. "Alright," he said. "I don't know or remember who you are, but if you can help me, I'll follow you." He took a deep breath. "Lead the way."


	5. The Full Moon

**Disclaimer: Only the OC's are mine, I don't own any of the places or characters. **

**A/N: Sorry for the lack of updates. School has been horrible right now and I've just been really busy. The next chapter is the last one and I'll try to get it up ASAP.**

The Marauders hurried out of the library. James, Sirius, and Peter each had equally worried looks on their faces while Remus just looked confused and scared. They quickly ran towards the forest again, trying to get away from people before the sun set and the moon rose. The one problem with this was the fact that Remus was extremely weak and slowed down their pace a lot. Eventually, James transformed into a stag, much to the shock of Remus, and carried him further into the forest, the others following in their respective Animagi forms.

Finally, they had to stop. The sun was setting already setting and they needed to rest before spending the night keeping a werewolf in check. However, before they rested, they fenced off the area of the forest they were in and put a lot of protection charms on the area. They finished off with sound proofing the fenced-in area and hiding it so no one could see them.

Then, all they could do was wait for the moon to rise.

At first they just sat there in silence, none of them quite knowing what to say. Remus wasn't sure how to act around the rest of the Marauders. He still didn't remember them and he wasn't quite sure what he was supposed to do. The rest of the Marauders, on the other hand, didn't want to do anything to worry or scare Remus. Finally, Remus broke the awkward silence. "What exactly is going to happen when the moon rises?" He asked.

James, Sirius, and Peter looked at each other, silently deciding who was going to answer and what they were going to say. "Well, you're going to transform and we're going to transform and keep you from hurting yourself," Sirius explained. He didn't want to go into too much detail if he didn't have to, since he didn't want to worry his friend. "You'll stay that way for the whole night and then when the moon sets you'll turn back."

"But what exactly will I be turning into?" Remus asked. "And how will I transform? Will it be like what you guys did earlier?"

"You'll turn into a wolf," James told him. He ignored the last two questions though; he didn't want to tell Remus about the horrors of being a werewolf.

However, Remus picked up on what they were doing. "You're not telling me something," he said. "What is it? What's really going to happen?"

"Well, we don't want to worry you…" Peter said hesitantly.

"You're worrying me more by not telling me!" Remus said, his voice rising slightly. "What's going to happen? Am I a monster or something?"

"You are not a monster!" Sirius said. "It doesn't matter what happens, just remember that you are not a monster!"

"Why can't you guys just tell-" Remus was cut off as the moon began to shine down onto them.

Remus stiffened and began to shake, his eyes wide with fear. "What-what's happening!?" His voice was loud and panicky. "What's going o-" The rest of his statement was cut off as the first wave of pain hit him, causing him to scream. His screwed his eyes shut and curled up in a ball, but the pain still came. He couldn't remember ever feeling anything that painful before in his life. His entire body was being twisted and pulled, his bones breaking, fur growing, everything just changing at once. Then his mind started to go and he could feel the wolf begin to take over. He tried to call out to the others, but his voice was already gone, replaced by a howl.

Then, it was all over.

When Remus had first started to transform, his friends could only watch in shock. They always knew that the transformation was more painful than Remus usually made it seem, but watching their friend scream and writhe in pain made them realize just shocked them. Finally, they snapped out of it and remembered that they couldn't be in their human forms when his transformation finished. They quickly changed into their Animagi forms, only to come face to face with Moony.

Yet there was something different about him. It took the Marauders a few moments to figure it out, but finally they realized that Moony wasn't watching them to see if they would start playing, he was watching them to see if they would attack. Apparently the backfired spell had carried over to his werewolf form, which only made their job that night a lot harder.

Moony snarled and pounced at Sirius, who darted to the side and ran away. James then came up behind Moony and tagged him, thus becoming the new target until Sirius distracted the werewolf. It was like every other game of tag they played during the full moon, except for the fact that one slip up could cost them their lives. James, Sirius, and Peter quickly became completely exhausted, but they continued the deadly game, each continuing to "play" in order to keep themselves and the others alive.

As the night wore on Moony became more frustrated and managed to slash at them a few times, though thankfully none of the wounds were too serious. Only once was there an actual battle. Moony had been chasing James when Sirius went to distract him. However, he didn't manage to get away in time and a second later Moony was on top of him, biting and clawing. James managed to drive him away, but Sirius had gotten several bad wounds before then.

After what seemed like an eternity, Moony stopped chasing the others and curled up, preparing for the moon to set. His transformation was as horrible as it had been earlier in the evening. Yet Remus realized that as the wolf's presence began to fade in his mind his memories were coming back. When it was all over he looked up at his friends, who were staring at him concernedly.

He managed to grin shakily at them, but his memories hadn't come without a price. Between his now-pounding skull and the after effects of a horrible full moon, his body just wasn't strong enough and, not long after transforming back, he blacked out once more.


	6. The Day After

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters. **

**A/N: So, I told you guys that this would be the last chapter. Well, I lied. I decided to break this chapter down into two parts, so the real last chapter will be the next one. Sorry this one is so short, but honestly, it did work better as two chapters.**

"When's he going to wake up?"

"Dunno. Hopefully soon, he's been out for most of the day."

"I hope he's alright, d'you think he has his memories back yet?"

Remus groaned and rolled over, trying to block out the sound of the three boys talking. His head was still pounding and his whole body hurt, though he didn't know why. All he wanted to do was sleep, but his friends had other plans in mind.

"Hey guys, I think he's awake!"

Remus braced himself for the "attack" that was sure to follow, but it never came. He cautiously opened his eyes and looked around. He was in his tent, which made sense considering they were still in CT. His friends were sitting in a semi-circle around him, looking both happy and eager at the same time. He sat up and winced; whatever had happened the night before was painful. He quickly recounted the days in his head, just to make sure that last night wasn't the full moon, but he still had three days before he had to worry about that.

"Hey Moony, how're you?" James asked. He had a few scratches on his face that Remus didn't remember being there before.

"I'm fine," he said. "Sore, really, really sore, but I'm fine. What did we do last night?"

His three friends exchanged worried looks. "Moony, what do you remember?" Sirius asked. He was holding his side, as if it hurt him, and Remus could've sworn he saw bandages.

"You guys were playing Exploding Snap last night and I wandered off to read," he said. "I don't really remember much after that. Did you guys come after me and prank me or something?"

Now his friends looked really worried and that was starting to bother Remus. "Guys, what's going on?" He asked. "What happened last night?"

"Remus, how many days until the full moon?" Peter asked. He looked the best out of all of them; as far as Remus could tell he didn't have any injuries.

"Three," he replied without hesitation; he had done the math earlier, he knew how many days there were until the full moon. Why were they even asking him this?

"No," Sirius said. "There's twenty nine days."

Remus frowned. That was impossible. If there were twenty nine days left until the full moon, then that would mean that there had been a full moon the night before. That would explain why he was in so much pain and why James and Sirius were both injured, but then why didn't he remember the three days before the full moon? When he voiced this question to his friends, for once they didn't look worried.

"Well, see, this is the part we aren't entirely sure of," James said. "We have a pretty good idea of what happened, but it's more of a theory than anything else."

"Okay, well, what's this "theory" of yours then?" Remus asked, trying to stay calm, which wasn't exactly easy to do. He had just found out that he was missing three days of his life, one of which happened to include a full moon. Considering how many things Remus could think of that could have gone wrong, he was a doing a pretty good job of not freaking out.

"Well, you remember leaving to go read, but the thing is, we never left camp," Peter said. "The next morning you weren't here, but we figured you just wandered off for a little bit. Then you still didn't return so we started to look for you."

Sirius continued where Peter had left off. "Long story short, we met up later in the day and none of us had found you, but it had looked like you were heading towards Kent. Then I remembered seeing you with a book that was talking about this spell that would temporarily erase your memory. What we think happened is that you tried out that spell, in order to forget about the full moon, but it ended up erasing all of your memories relating to being a werewolf- including us."

"We found you in Kent yesterday, tucked away in a corner of the wizards' library," James said. "And we brought you out here, where you transformed. You still didn't remember us though, and that's how Sirius got injured. We think the spell may have reversed itself now- you can remember being a werewolf and everything, but it's erased those three days where you didn't remember anything."

Remus just stared at them. What they were telling him was unbelievable, insane, and most likely true. He knew that he had a book like that, though he had no idea where it was now. It would also explain his pounding headache and why he didn't remember the past few days. But still, that would mean that he had done this to himself, that he had ignored all reason and decided to cast a spell that would mess with his mind, a spell that he didn't even know how to perform. How could he have been so stupid?

Remus looked up at his friends. They all had the now-familiar worried expressions on their faces again, not like he could blame them, really. He took a deep breath and asked, "So, what do we do now?"


	7. Epilogue

**Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine except the few OC's. I don't own any of the places either.**

**A/N: Well, here it is- the last chapter. Thanks to everyone who took the time to leave reviews, or even to just read. You guys rock!**

The Marauders spent the next few days in their secluded and magically- hidden campsite. For once, Remus wasn't the one that needed to rest the most; Sirius's injuries made it hard for him to do too much of anything. Peter Apparated to Kent a couple of times to get food and medicine for the others, since he was the least injured out of any of them. They would have stayed there longer but after Sirius threatened to hex James if he kept them there any longer, they all decided to start hiking again even more. They needed to find someone to help them, but until Sirius was well enough to Apparate without splinching himself, they couldn't return to England. None of them were willing to split up, not even now; Marauders always stuck together, no matter what. They ended up just started hiking South, hoping that they would find a large city where someone could help Remus get his memories back.

It was almost like the beginning of their trip; while they spent most of their time talking and joking, there were periods when Remus would become quiet and withdrawn, though this didn't happen often enough to really concern his friends. They knew that he was worried and upset about his memory being messed up, not like they could blame him. Until they found someone to help them there wasn't really a lot they could do except just try to distract him and keep looking for someone to reverse the effects of the spell.

"How long until we reach a large city?" Sirius asked one afternoon as they set up their camp quite a ways away from the main road that they had been following. The forest had slowly been disappearing, only to be replaced by more buildings and homes, and they often had to hunt for quite awhile before finding a place to camp for the night. They were also forced to, for the most part, use Disillusionment charms, so the Muggles wouldn't get suspicious; they were in that area where it wasn't the right place for hikers to be around, but it wasn't urban enough for them to just blend in with the crowd.

"I'm not quite sure," James admitted. "We should be a city soon, though it's much smaller than London. I don't when exactly we'll get there though." Truth be told, none of them exactly knew where they were. They had been traveling at a relatively slow pace for a couple of days; while they all wanted to hurry and get Remus his memories back, they all knew that, despite what he said, Sirius was not exactly up to traveling quickly. However, the slow pace had only succeeded in confusing them. They had figured out exactly how many days it would take to get to certain places in Connecticut, but since they were traveling slower than before their calculations were off.

"Anyway, we'll get there when we get there," Remus said. "How're you feeling, Sirius? I saw the injuries you had- are they any better?" While he didn't come out and say it, the others knew he was just wanted to know whether or not he was up to Apparating. The others may have had high hopes of finding someone to help them here, but Remus wanted to go back to England where he knew several people that could help them.

"Eh, a bit better," Sirius said. They were using all of the spells they knew on him, but werewolf-inflicted wounds always took awhile to heal, unless you were using powerful potions and spells on them. All of the smaller injuries had healed, on him as well as on the others, but the larger ones weren't. One particularly nasty one was being magically held shut and, until it was nearly completely healed, none of them wanted to risk letting Sirius Apparate, though just hiking wouldn't do anything to the wound. "But don't worry about me," he continued. "I mean, if nothing else we have enough money to buy a potion that heal these up and then I can Apparate back with the rest of you."

Remus's face reddened with embarrassment; he had hoped that his friends wouldn't realize why he was always asking about Sirius's injuries. "Hey now, none of that!" James said. "We're going to find someone to help you, or find a spell to help you, or a potion or _something_. And if we don't find something here, we'll just go back to England and get someone we know there to do it. You're going to get your memory back mate, I promise."

XXXXX

"Who knew it'd be that hard to find this place!" Peter muttered. They had finally arrived in the first city, or large town, depending on who you asked, since the full moon. They had wandered around the center of town for a couple of hours, trying to see if they could find a shop or something that would lead them to the Wizarding section, like there was in London to get into Diagon Alley. Finally they found the entrance tucked away in a secluded corner of a shopping plaza.

But finding the entrance to the Wizarding section of the town was only the beginning. They then still had to find something or someone to help them. They exchanged the rest of their Muggle money and spent the rest of the day wandering among the shops. For once, James wasn't staring at the different brooms on display in the Quidditch shops and Sirius wasn't tucked away in some secluded joke shop. Instead, they were hunting through the various shops that sold potions, carefully combing through them to see if there were any that could help. Remus was looking in a book shop, but only to see if there was something in a book that may help them and Peter was with him so they could look through more books.

Still, even with them looking in different stores they didn't find anything even remotely helpful that day. They found a spot a ways away from the plaza to camp that night, protecting their campsite extra well. Then, at the crack of dawn the next morning they were up and looking through the shops again, hoping and praying that they would find something that they could use. Remus and Peter found a couple of books about temporary memory spells, jotting down notes on things that may help. Meanwhile, James and Sirius were having a little bit of luck; they managed to find a store that had potions strong enough to heal Sirius's wounds, though there were no potions for restoring someone's memory.

However, it wasn't until the next day that they actually found something that they knew would help them. It was Remus who had spotted the book tucked away in a corner of the shop. Not only did it talk about the exact spell Remus had used, but it also mentioned several ways to reverse side-effects of the spell. James had found a potion that claimed to be able to restore any memories lost due to a temporary-memory spell, like the one Remus used. When the Marauders met back up for lunch, they began to discuss the pros and cons of their findings.

"The problem with the book," Peter pointed out. "Is that none of us know the spells it talks about, so we could only mess up Moony's mind even more."

"But we can copy down the spell information and we wouldn't even need to buy the book," James said. "We don't have enough money to buy both. Then, if the spell doesn't work we can just use the potion."

"No, the store owner won't let us back in there unless we're buying," Remus told him. "He said his store wasn't a library and we either had to buy the books or get out."

"So if we can't really use the book, let's just go with the potion!" Sirius said.

"But we don't know anything about that potion," James reminded him. "For all we know it could do more harm than anything else."

"But as Peter pointed out, casting the spells could screw things up even more as well!" Sirius sighed. "So what are we going to do?"

"Let's buy the potion," Remus said. "If we're buying it from a good store then we'll probably be safe, or at least safer than if we tried to perform advanced spells we don't know. Then, if the potion doesn't work we'll look for a library that has that book that Peter and I found and we'll try out the spells. If that doesn't work, then Sirius should be well enough to Apparate and we can have someone back home sort things out."

The others thought about it for a moment. None of them, including Remus, felt completely comfortable with this plan, since there were so many things that could go wrong, but they also knew that they didn't have a lot of other options. After they bought the potion they set up their camp away from the hustle and bustle of the Muggle world, double and triple checking all of the spells they cast, especially their sound proofing one, since, as Remus put it, messing with someone's mind had the tendency to cause them quite a bit of pain.

Once everything was done they gathered in Remus's tent. "I do not need all of this," Remus growled. He was surrounded by all of the pillows and blankets they had, so if he blacked out again at least he would be comfortable, but he didn't like it when his friends worried so much about him. "I'm telling you, I will be _fine_."

"Oh, I'm sure you will," Sirius said. "But humor us and just sit there. At least this way if you black out again we won't need to drag you in here."

Remus scowled, but didn't say anything. He picked up the small potion vial and looked at it for a moment before gulping it down. His friends watched him anxiously, waiting to see if it would work. He grinned at them, though his smile was shaky and nervous. Suddenly, he hunched over and grabbed his head, crying out at the unexpected burst of pain. He clenched his teeth, trying to stay silent as his skull continued to pound. His friends looked on worriedly, unable to do anything to help him. Finally, after what seemed like hours, the pounding slowly faded away. Remus collapsed against the pillows, panting and shaking slightly.

"I'm okay… No really, just give me a few minutes and I'll be fine," Remus said between gasps before his friends could even ask him how he was.

"You don't look like you're fine," Peter mumbled. Sirius let out a bark of laughter, but shut up after Remus glared at him.

"So Moony, did you get your memory back?" James asked, trying to avoid a "fight" between Sirius and Remus.

Remus frowned and thought for a moment. "Well, I can remember being off by myself… and you guys weren't there… it's weird because I can remember not remembering things during those days." He blinked, and then grinned. "So I guess I've got my memory back."

Sirius let out a loud cheer and tackled his friend, while Peter started laughing and grinning like a maniac. James pulled Sirius off of Remus, mumbling something about reopening his wounds and hurting Remus, but he was grinning and laughing just like the rest of them. When they had finally calmed down and stopped laughing insanely, they all agreed on one thing.

Not to tell anyone else what had happened.


End file.
